The border guard originates from the IDF's "frontier guard" ("Kheyl Ha'Sfar"), and came into being as the "Border Guard" in 1953, subordinated to the Israel Police and not to the IDF, though it is a paramilitary force.

The border guard is tasked both with external border protection as well as internal order maintenance and includes the security services' leading anti-terror unit called the "Yamam" ("the special [anti-terror] police unit"). The emblem of the guard is the concrete watch-tower of a Mandatory-era "Teggart Fortress" (some accounts say it is of the fortress at Nebi Yusha), and is supposed to symbolize power and determination (ref: the founding documents of the unit). In VF-EF; JTM-EP-8.